Exclusive Material in the Collector's Guide
Revenge of the Sith Collectors Guide
IDG, the publishers of the popular Star Wars Insider magazine,
will be coming out with a collectors guide for Revenge of the Sith. IDG
has done this for all previous Star Wars films and feels why stop
now. Officially titled The Official Guide: Star Wars Revenge of
the Sith," the collectable program will offer exclusive behind-the-scenes,
interviews, and movie stills. The magazine will also feature the latest
biographies of all the newest Star Wars saga characters. I'm sure
I do not have to say anymore, so head over to the Star
Wars
site and purchase one of your own for under $10.00.
Grevious Finds a Voice
According to the Star Wars Homing Beacon #128, the voice of Grevious
will come from Matthew Wood, the Supervising Sound Editor for the latest
Star Wars trilogy. I first thought 'what!,' but considering that
they can morph any sound or voice, any person on the street could have been
possible. If Lucas had to use anyone, it might as well have been a sound
editor. One of the most interesting thing bits to the news is that it only
took Wood three hours total to lay down all the voice tracks for Grevious.
Does this character rarely talk? Here is what Star Wars says on
the matter:
When General Grievous barks his orders, his
minions scurry to carry out their tasks. His is a commanding presence, and
his fearsome demeanor leaves no room for questions. His implacable metallic
skeleton gives him the aspect of a droid, but hidden inside the armored
carapace is an unwholesome, living being. To remind viewers of this inner
Grievous, his words are occasionally punctuated with a hard, wet hacking
cough -- suggesting that Grievous is literally rotten to the core.
Providing the voice of Grievous is Matthew Wood, whose history with Star
Wars has been mostly behind-the-scenes. Though Wood is an actor, his contribution
to the prequel trilogy has been primarily as Supervising Sound Editor. His
access to the Episode III production process may have given him a head's
up that casting was underway for the part, but the use of a pseudonym ensured
that insider status didn't factor into the selection process.
On set, Duncan Young read Grievous' lines for the benefit of the actors.
His voice was never intended to make it into the final film, and it was
edited out of the mix early on along with much of the production audio.
Ben Burtt and others supplied temporary voices on the track, all heavily
modulated to be appropriate for a cyborg general.
"We put out a casting package of those modulated voices, looking for voice
actors," says Wood. "Chris Scarabosio processed each one, and we would play
these for George for him to evaluate. We went through a lot of different
people, and on the last package we sent out, I put my own voice on there,
though I didn't put my name on it."
With the pseudonym "Alan Smithee," Wood's reading of Grievous was played
for Lucas without introduction, and he selected it. "It was great, but then
I thought, 'should I tell him that it's me?'"recounts Wood. "When George
found out, he said 'Great, let's record him tomorrow.'"
In a three-hour recording session, Wood laid down all of Grievous lines.
"He's definitely an evil character. He's the leader of the droid army, but
not a droid. He feels things; he feels things extremely, I would say. It's
a lot of yelling, and shouting out orders, so it had a lot of drill sergeant
to it."
While studying acting at American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco,
Wood came across a website that offered samples of various accents to help
actors hear and mimic patterns of speech from around the world. "You could
hear the same line of dialogue read in different accents," he says. "I liked
the sound of the Eastern European and Romanian accents. Also, I had just
come back from Prague, so I had that in mind for Grievous."
In the finished film, Grievous' voice will undergo some sort of processing.
Currently, it is lowered in pitch and has a ring modulation to it. That
may change as the audio mix is still being put together. Wood offers the
caveat that everything may still change, having witnessed all the prequels
being made. "But I did also record Grievous for the Episode III videogame.
I did 125 lines of dialogue for that."
For movie stills, a trailer, and synopsis, head over to the Star
Wars: Revenge of the Sith Movie Page. |
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